WASHINGTON, March 1 - The Supreme Court ruled today, in one of the most closely watched capital punishment cases in years, that imposing the death penalty on convicted murderers who were younger than 18 at the time of their crimes is unconstitutional.

The 5-to-4 decision, arising from a Missouri case, holds that executing young killers violates "the evolving standards of decency that mark the progress of a maturing society," and that American society has come to regard juveniles as less culpable than adult criminals.

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The ruling, which acknowledged "the overwhelming weight of international opinion against the juvenile death penalty," erases the death sentences imposed on 72 defendants in 12 states who were juveniles at the time they killed. Although 19 states nominally permit the execution of juvenile murderers, only Texas, Virginia and Oklahoma have executed any in the past decade.

The case decided today had attracted attention around the world. Briefs on behalf of the young Missouri killer, Christopher Simmons, had been filed by the European Union, the 45-member Council of Europe and other organizations. A brief filed by former United Nations diplomats asserted that the United States' failure to repudiate the execution of juveniles was an irritant in international relations.

Until today, the United States and Somalia were the only nations that permitted putting teenage criminals to death. The court's ruling today held that, while the "overwhelming weight of international opinion" was not controlling, it nevertheless provided "respected and significant confirmation" for the majority's finding.

The majority decision today, declaring that people who kill at age 16 or 17 cannot be executed, was written by Justice Anthony M. Kennedy. It declared that prohibiting the execution of juvenile killers is a natural and logical conclusion to the court's 6-to-3 ruling in 2002 that executing mentally retarded offenders is categorically unconstitutional.

A 1988 Supreme Court decision barred execution of defendants who killed when they were younger than 16. But the court upheld capital punishment for 16- and 17-year-olds in a 1989 decision, when the lineup of justices was different. That decision was swept aside today.

"The age of 18 is the point where society draws the line for many reasons between childhood and adulthood," Justice Kennedy wrote, in an opinion joined by Justices John Paul Stevens, David H. Souter, Ruth Bader Ginsburg and Stephen G. Breyer. "It is, we conclude, the age at which the line for death eligibility ought to rest."

"The court's decision today establishes a categorical rule forbidding the execution of any offender for any crime committed before his 18th birthday, no matter how deliberate, wanton, or cruel the offense," Justice O'Connor wrote. "Neither the objective evidence of contemporary societal values, nor the court's moral-proportionately analysis, nor the two in tandem suffice to justify this ruling."

While adolescents as a class are "undoubtedly less mature, and therefore less culpable" than adults, Justice O'Connor wrote, many state legislatures around the country had concluded that at least some juveniles were deserving of the ultimate penalty because of the depravity of their crimes.

Justice Scalia, in a dissent joined by Chief Justice Rehnquist and Justice Thomas, said the majority opinion had made "a mockery" of constitutional precedent and was based "on the flimsiest of grounds."

"The court thus proclaims itself sole arbiter of our nation's moral standards - and in the course of discharging that awesome responsibility purports to take guidance from the views of foreign courts and legislatures," Justice Scalia wrote.

Today's ruling in Roper v. Simmons, No. 03-633, arose from a Missouri murder that even the majority on the court acknowledged as particularly heinous. In 1993, Christopher Simmons was a 17-year-old high school junior when he and two younger teenagers burglarized a house. Even if they were caught, Christopher Simmons told his friends, they could "get away with it" because they were minors, Justice Kennedy noted.

The biggest dissapointment comes from this even being close. Should have been 9/0

"I live in a town called Millhaven
And it's small and it's mean and it's cold
But if you come around just as the sun goes down
You can watch the whole town turn to gold
It's around about then that I used to go a-roaming

Singing La la la la La la la lie
All God's children they all gotta die
My name is Loretta but I prefer Lottie
I'm closing in on my fifteenth year
And if you think you have seen a pair of eyes more green
Then you sure didn't see them around here
My hair is yellow and I'm always a-combing

La la la la La la la lie
Mama often told me we all got to die
You must have heard about The Curse Of Millhaven
How last Christmas Bill Blake's little boy didn't come home
They found him next week in One Mile Creek
His head bashed in and his pockets full of stones
Well, just imagine all the wailing and moaning
La la la la La la la lie
Even little Billy Blake's boy, he had to die
..."

Yes, because I'm sure that someone sharing their opinion on a message board is a personality flaw...and I insulted your intelligence, not your typing skills...

Edit: And I believe that in some cases, the death penalty is warranted. The difference between the maturity of a 16-17 year old and an 18 year old is negligible, and our society has instilled upon these kids that murder is the worst crime to commit. They knew better, they did it anyways.

"It declared that prohibiting the execution of juvenile killers is a natural and logical conclusion to the court's 6-to-3 ruling in 2002 that executing mentally retarded offenders is categorically unconstitutional."

Sharing an opinion and flaming someone fortheir opinion are 2 different things.

Becuase one has opinion that is different from yours does not make them an idiot. .. and yes you were commenting on my typing skills .. since you had no other response to my critique of your immature attitude to people who you disagree with

" The Supreme Court called all 17 year olds "retards" "

No that the heinous nature of capital punishment cannot be reserved to those who do not deserve it under our current Constititution ..

I live in Canada. We don't have capital punishment. In some cases, I wish we did. For criminals like Clifford Olsen, who admitted to his horrific acts, it means I wouldn't have to pay taxes to keep him alive in prison the rest of his life. For others, like a fellow from Ontario (I can't recall his name, and tried Googling but I'm drinking beer so fat luck to that ) who was aquitted after being proven innocent 24 years after being accused of murder, the death penalty would have proved very dangerous.

I don't believe it's an appropriate punishment for youth, but I do wish our government would look at the possibility of carefully reinstating it *only* to be used in extreme cases (like Olsen).

"Simply stated, the Court has decided that "adult punishment" (whatever THAT is) is universally and automatically "cruel and unusual" for those under the arbitrary age of 18."

no it's not aduklt punishment . it is a final punishemnt. Death sentence means no turning back .. life in prison can lead to rehab, redemption and maybe even vindication since their have been cases where people on death row have been released when evidence has vindicated them.

"Next we'll be putting underage marderers in "timeout", then letting them go because they "didn't know better"."

Why not .. we put mass muderers in charge of the Dept of Defence and the Intelligencwe Czar

The Court said that executions of minors violated the Eighth Amendment ban on cruel and unusual punishment.

That was their entire argument.

"Adult punishment" is cruel and unusual when applied to minors.

More importantly, it applies to CRIMES commited when the person is a minor.

If "adult punishment" cannot be applied to crimes committed as a minor, how can minors be sentenced to adult prisons? In fact, how can they be sentenced to juvanile authorities till they are 18 and THEN sent to adult prisons?

The act is still committed while under age. Committing them to an adult sentence inside an adult prison appears, per the court decision, to be cruel and unusual.

Good maybe they'll get rid of the death penalty once and for all for everyone, You'd think after all these years these retards would figure out that it does absolutely nothing to deter crime and it costs us more to kill the killers than it does to just imprison them for life anyways.

Kashell-WEposted on 3/1/05 4:11pm I don't understand why we keep people in prison for life when it's costing taxpayers 17,000 dollers a year per inmate, and when the USA has the most inmates of any country in the world.

It makes no sense. The un-used death penalty makes sense, if it were actually used.
[hr][/blockquote]

Yeah but it costs much more to execute someone than to leave them in prison, so it makes tons of sense. Now if they got rid of that silly appeals process, have at it.

The death penalty WOULD detur crime if it wasn't such a bloody joke in the US.

When someone is sentanced to death, they should get one appeal. ONE. After that, they are taken outside and shot in the back of the head. This process would also make it MUCH less costly to execute someone then house them for life, as it should be.

I'm also in favor of extending the death penalty to repeat violent offenders.

And insanity/retardation is a pointless defense. It doesn't matter WHAT their mental capacity is, if they are a danger to society, you remove them. And it makes even MORE sense to execute the violently insane/retarded since BY DEFENITION they will NEVER be able to reform.

Anon, you probelm is that you can;t see outside the box and look how one precedent affects the rest like toppling a row of dominoes .. but here it is explained for you so you can grasp it... I am sorry for once agin proving you wrong.

" The 1976 case addressed a reworded Georgia Death Penalty statute. "

Gregg v. Georgia ruling by the U.S. Supreme Court that reinstated the death penalty. Since 1976, over 850 condemned prisoners have been executed, while about 3,700 sit on death row.

The 1976 Gregg ruling marked the beginning of the modern period of capital punishment. Just four years earlier, the Supreme Court had declared an effective moratorium on the death penalty when it ruled, in Furman v. Georgia, that all existing death penalty statutes were unconstitutional. The justices found that the prevailing pattern of arbitrary imposition of the death penalty could no longer be tolerated. In the words of Justice Potter Stewart, "These death sentences are cruel and unusual in the same way that being struck by lightning is cruel and unusual" - - they are capriciously, freakishly, and wantonly imposed.

But when the court reinstated the death penalty in 1976 by recognizing new statutes in Georgia, Florida, and Texas, it in effect declared that all the problems that it had recognized four years earlier would now be resolved through implementation of the new procedures contained in the statutes of these three states, statutes that established "guided discretion" for imposing a death sentence.

Thanks for confirming what I already knew. It had nothing to do with "detering" crime and everything to do with the 8th Amendment.

___

"Yeah but it costs much more to execute someone than to leave them in prison, so it makes tons of sense"

"Cost" is not an inhibitor to justice. Justice has no set financial boundaries. Prisons cost money. So do judges, juries and courtrooms.

So do "expert witnesses".

By this same argument, we should just get rid of the judicial branch entirely and have anarchy.

It'll save LOADS of cash!

______

Personally, I believe the Court should have concerned itself more with Equal Protection.

The constitutionality of the Death Penalty should be addressed on an individual, not on a collective, basis.

The only question the Court should address with the individual is; "Was this person capable of understanding the severity of the crime committed?"

Age is not a requisite factor in this determination. However, the INDIVIDUAL is a factor. Some people are incapable of understanding the gravity of the crime even when they are adults. Others are more than capable of understanding the severity of the crime as minors.

If the INDIVIDUAL was able to understand the severity of the crime and the severity of the consequences then they fit well within the perimeters of Equal Protection. Regardless of age.

What happens at 18 that makes you suddenly aware enough to vote? Or to buy cigarettes responsibly> Or to gamble? What clicks in your brain that makes you psychologoically OK with entering into a contract, or knowing the ramifications of your legal actions/

It's a line that has been drawn in the sand (albeit arbitrarily) by the government. If we are going to treat people like they are too irresponsible to handle big grown up decision making until they are 18 we should atleast stick to our guns. If tyhey are old enough to know what they are doing, and to be executed for it at 16, then we should drop every single age regulation to 16. At the age that oyu can comprehend the true magnitude of killing someone, you are old enough to get the true magnitude of signing a contract, or smoking.